Mahan disputes Drake's claim that plan is "secret"

By Tim O'Brien

Updated 8:12 pm, Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Republican town supervisor candidate Todd Drake blasted incumbent Democrat Paula Mahan for what he called a lack of transparency in overseeing the town's finances.

Drake submitted a Freedom of Information request to the town asking for a copy of Mahan's fiscal 10-year plan, which she often refers to when discussing her attempts to bring the budget into line.

"We don't know if the Mahan administration's secret 10-year plan is simply based on raising taxes or if it's even working at all," he said during a news conference outside Town Hall Tuesday.

Mahan said the plan is hardly a secret. It's been on the town's website since 2008, where it remains under "Key Documents."

"If he wants a hard copy and can't print it out, we'll happily print one out for him," she said.

The document was presented during Mahan's first year in office in six different public meetings held in different parts of the town, she said.

"It's on our website. It's been on our website. It's there for anybody to review," Mahan said. "This was all public."

After reviewing the document, Drake said by email it did not provide the type of revenue and expense projections the town needs to properly plan its budgets.

"To be clear, a memo does not make a financial plan. Nor does a document that lacks a quantitative analysis of fiscal policy or fails to provide future projections of revenues and expenditures," he wrote. "The Mahan administration's inability to understand the difference between a memo and a financial plan helps explain their poor management of taxpayer dollars."

At his news conference, Drake pointed to a report by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli, a Democrat, in 2012 that said "The town's 2012 proposed budget document did not contain sufficient information to make it useful, either in assisting town management in planning and monitoring the financial operations of the town, or in providing the public with enough information about the town's financial plan to allow for meaningful input at the budget hearing."

Mahan said the comptroller's recommendations have since been adopted for both the 2013 and 2014 budgets. She said pulling a single sentence out of a lengthy report is misleading.

Drake said he would make quarterly financial reports available online, at Town Hall and the William K. Sanford Town Library so residents could see how the town was spending taxpayers' money. He also would create a four-year financial plan to project spending and revenue.

"Colonie would adopt a practice of regular fiscal reports to be presented quarterly. We can track budgetary cash flow throughout the fiscal year," he said.

Mahan said she and the Town Board get monthly reports, and anyone who wants a copy can get them. The documents are not published on the town website.

Drake accused Mahan of violating a 2007 promise not to raise taxes further. Her proposed 2014 budget calls for a less than 2 percent tax increase that would raise the average home owner's bill $10.96 a year.

Colonie has one of the lower municipal tax rates in the Capital Region, and DiNapoli's report also said the town overly relied on sales tax, which is more volatile, than property tax.

Drake was asked if it was realistic to expect a candidate never to raise taxes over six years. He replied that might not be an issue if Mahan had not done it repeatedly.

"If this was the only tax increase by the Mahan administration, one could make that argument," he said. "You can't say never raise taxes. You can say raising taxes cannot be the cornerstone of any turnaround."

Mahan said the town has taken multiple steps to reduce costs and kept any increases low.

"We take a very conservative approach to our finances, and we are continually monitoring everything," she said.

She accused Drake of not being familiar with the town's operations.

"He's making statements without any background knowledge," she said. "He needs to look at the entire picture and the finances when we got here. The deficits were huge. We've gone through a recession. We had no cash reserves. I don't think he understands what he's talking about."